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Chelsea at One Month

Chelsea is already a month old, if you can believe it. It has flown by for us. I think being in the hospital for 5 days sped things up somewhat. We’ve had some ups and downs this month for sure.

The ups:
• she has recovered from RSV. She occasionally still coughs, so I think there’s some lingering congestion, but otherwise she’s doing great.
• she started smiling around 3 weeks and is a pretty content baby (more on her smiling here). She doesn’t cry too much and when she does, she’s easy to calm down, at least compared to Mal who would cry and cry and cry, then cry some more.
• she usually gives me a four hour stretch to sleep at night. Once she even went 6 hours between feedings. Crossing my fingers that she turns into a good sleeper like Mal.

Some downs:
• the doctor called last week to let us know that Chelsea didn’t pass one part of the newborn screening test and she may be at risk for having Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH). CAH is a genetic defect and a person with CAH does not produce several vital hormones. I took Chelsea back to the doctor last Thursday for a blood draw to retest her for CAH (poor baby girl — it took the nurse 3 tries in 3 different spots to find a good vein). We thought we’d get results in a week (today), but the doctor called today to say that there was a mix up with the lab, so Chelsea had to go back in for another blood draw (the nurse found a good vein the first try this time!). Again, we should hear in a week what the results of the retest are. The doctor and I are hopeful that she had a false-positive on her newborn screen due to the fact that her blood for the initial test was taken when she was in the hospital for RSV. From the research I’ve done, stress and dehydration can affect the test results (she was on IV fluids at the time for dehydration). We are praying this is the case for Chelsea. We’ll keep you posted.
• this isn’t that big of a deal (especially with CAH lingering over us), but it looks like we have a projectile vomiter on our hands. Mal did this in addition to the constant spitting up which is why she always wore a bib as a baby. Chelsea doesn’t do the little spit-ups, just massive projective vomiting, once or twice a day. I’m getting better about predicting when its going to happen, so I can usually get her situated over an easy to clean surface. She doesn’t seem to be in pain, but it’s a bit frustrating for the rest of us.

I’ve uploaded a few new pictures of Chelsea and Mallory. Here’s a glimpse:

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4 thoughts on “Chelsea at One Month”

Paula and I will keep Chelsea and the rest of the Wilke family in our prayers. I am glad to hear that Chelsea is easier to calm down. I am glad she didn’t take after her older sister in that area. 🙂 We will talk to you guys soon.